A 31-year-old protester over the weekend pleaded not guilty to assault charges in connection with the headline-making incident in which Education Secretary Betsy DeVos was temporarily blocked from entering a Washington, D.C., middle school…

Police identified the protester as Bilal Ahmed Askaryar… Askaryar came to the United States as a 5-year-old refugee from Afghanistan, according to biographical information included in commentary he wrote last month for NPR…

A police report obtained by POLITICO says that Askaryar… was given “several lawful orders” to move out of the way of a vehicle, and then pushed an individual identified as “V-1.”